It's hard to say, there are several knockdown skills. It may have been slick shoes, which is one of my must-have skills in WvW.

Engineers are pretty awesome.

I am enjoying my Engineer (just hit 28) for the most part. The fact that auto-attack keeps turning off when I swap kits is really starting to bug me. It may seem like a small thing, but I am considering shelving the character until that bug gets fixed.

I usually run PvE with the rifle, thumper turret, elixir H, flamethrower and grenades. Never fell in love with bombs. I spent 6 SP on the tool kit last night and am regretting it. Doesn't feel right to melee with this character, and he sure can't do enough damage or take enough hits to warrant the trouble.

I usually run PvE with the rifle, thumper turret, elixir H, flamethrower and grenades. Never fell in love with bombs. I spent 6 SP on the tool kit last night and am regretting it. Doesn't feel right to melee with this character, and he sure can't do enough damage or take enough hits to warrant the trouble.

I think the tool kit exists solely for running a turret-based support build, since most of the tool kit skills repair turrets as a secondary function. It might be useful in groups but I don't think it was ever intended for soloing.

For PvE I use rifle with heal and rocket turrets, flamethrower, radiation field and supply drop as my elite. For WvW I swap out flamethrower and radiation field for the elixir gun and slick shoes. I'm specced primarily in firearms and invention. It's worked out fairly well for me so far.

I recently bought the mortar elite skill, it looks like it might be useful in WvW but i haven't had the opportunity to test it yet.

Anyone care to give an analysis of Short Bow vs. Pistol/Pistol as a ranged option? I'm running D/D (and love it, glass cannon and all), but I'm still undecided on what to do ranged. I'm lvl 26 now and mostly been using P/P for the blindness and easy kiting, but I see a lot of short bow builds out there and wonder whether I should switch. How do you bow people maximize your effectiveness? For ex, someone mentioned the Poison cloud/Death Blossom combo which I wasn't aware of.

Just wondering.

Oh, and Thieves frickin' rock. You have to be so active when you play them and use all your skills intelligently, I absolutely love it.

Anyone care to give an analysis of Short Bow vs. Pistol/Pistol as a ranged option? I'm running D/D (and love it, glass cannon and all), but I'm still undecided on what to do ranged. I'm lvl 26 now and mostly been using P/P for the blindness and easy kiting, but I see a lot of short bow builds out there and wonder whether I should switch. How do you bow people maximize your effectiveness? For ex, someone mentioned the Poison cloud/Death Blossom combo which I wasn't aware of.

Just wondering.

Oh, and Thieves frickin' rock. You have to be so active when you play them and use all your skills intelligently, I absolutely love it.

I want to know this too. I've been running with Shortbow but by no means am I optimizing. I'm not even paying any attention to stats these days except mostly to the damage as I level up.

I find P/D to actually be the best set to play the kiting game, you lose out on the P/P Blind spam but Dancing Daggers more than makes up for it, especially if you have the caltrops-on-dodge trait. combining those two elements lets me keep 1-2 mobs almost perma-crippled, and the pistol auto-fire skill Bleeds them without having to worry about aiming AOE(or keeping them in the ring).

I spec heavy on condition damage/duration and most of my battles are just me running a spiral around crippled mobs as they bleed to death.

also, on P/D, you have two melee skills that let you escape, either through stealth or shadowstep.

It doesn't have the raw damage output that P/P, D/D or S/P have access too, but it's definitely the one with the highest survivability rating if you can be patient with encounters.

My main is a Mesmer at level 22 and 3-4 hours in WvW. Similar to yours in that I mainly use the Signet skills and the Greatsword.

What do you run with as secondary weapons usually? Further down in your post you talk about a sceptre+sword, but you also discuss using a staff. Or do you have a different set of main/secondary weapons for PVE than PVP?

Currently I've been trying to keep one of each weapon up to date in one of my bags (although I accidentally sold off a sword), and I've unlocked every weapon skill.

Falchion wrote:

A Mesmer is a support class: an enemy force degrade-er . With clones and phantasms you can confuse other players while dealing damage in a skirmish. Ideally while the enemy is dealing with your squad mates or even the clones themselves. The clones also provide a way to apply conditions on a situational basis with the shatter skills, which is part of their main role; to constantly pile conditions on the enemy.

So far I really only use the F1 shatter, which is just pure damage. Can you sum up the different situations in which you'd think of using the other shatters? (Confusion, Daze, and Blind IIRC)

Falchion wrote:

I personally prefer the Signet utility skills for their simplicity; passive benefit while inactive, instant condition on target, interrupting them when activated. Putting Traits into Domination opens up a skill that recharges Signet skills faster.

Oh shoot - I started down the trait path that deal with my clones. Is it possible to redistribute the points ever?

All this talk of mesmers is not helping my altitis. As much as I am loving BL2, my altitis may bring me back into GW2 for a while.

I really struggled with the mesmer in several attempts. I like the feel of a lot of weapon combinations but thought that they lacked survivability AND damage potential. Switching to Charr may help with dps as they have 2 racial abilities that aren't on long cool downs that just might help with that.

I've been hopping back and forth between my engineer, ranger, thief, guardian and elementalist. I've just hit level 10 with my ele and at this point she has been, by far, the squishiest of all of my characters. I've lost track of how many times she's died.

I've played a lot of glass cannons in MMOs but with the others I've generally worked out good kiting techniques fairly quickly to up the survivability. Not so with the ele. I finally unlocked all of my weapon skills, except for the underwater ones, so I'm sure soloing with some of those combos led to a lot of the deaths but it still seems a bit high. So far my best soloing results seems to have come from using either dagger/dagger or dagger/focus with earth attunement. I've generally had the toughness sigil up and my 1 or 2 trait points have gone into the earth line as well. Any suggestions or strategies to help me save on all of these repair bills? Now in group events she's a monster but if any of the baddies notice her she's toast so while I'm blowing away a dozen enemies in these wave events she's still getting knocked out constantly because 1 or 2 baddies noticed her and made it to her before she killed them.

Started a Pistol/Shield engineer as my first character and am having a great time so far. #5 (ranged shield throw interrupt) is fun to mess around with. Anyone have tips for aiming with the grenade kit? Feels a bit clunky at first but its still a ton of fun.

Ya it definitely takes getting used to, especially when you're on the move.

I don't use the fast-ground-targeting option since I like seeing the AOE ring and if you have an easy to reach key as your skill1 bind you can just double tap to throw them where your cursor is.. and there isn't really any downside to just spamming the heck out of that one.

At close/medium ranges you can overshoot them(usually from the enemy rushing you) and the nades will still hit them on the way to the targeted spot. Though be careful at longer ranges since your nades will have a much bigger arc and often sail over the target.

In wvw I save grenades for keep assault/defense, and choke points. Very easy to lay down some 'nade spam in those circumstances. And like GrandmaFunk mentioned, I keep the aoe ring up, as it makes for easier targeting.

I've been hopping back and forth between my engineer, ranger, thief, guardian and elementalist. I've just hit level 10 with my ele and at this point she has been, by far, the squishiest of all of my characters. I've lost track of how many times she's died.

I've played a lot of glass cannons in MMOs but with the others I've generally worked out good kiting techniques fairly quickly to up the survivability. Not so with the ele. I finally unlocked all of my weapon skills, except for the underwater ones, so I'm sure soloing with some of those combos led to a lot of the deaths but it still seems a bit high. So far my best soloing results seems to have come from using either dagger/dagger or dagger/focus with earth attunement. I've generally had the toughness sigil up and my 1 or 2 trait points have gone into the earth line as well. Any suggestions or strategies to help me save on all of these repair bills? Now in group events she's a monster but if any of the baddies notice her she's toast so while I'm blowing away a dozen enemies in these wave events she's still getting knocked out constantly because 1 or 2 baddies noticed her and made it to her before she killed them.

I'm not a fan of dagger dagger until you get enough traits. You get the signet activation - fire aura in the Fire tree, then a variety of supporting traits - Fury/swiftness upon auras, 3 sec of protection upon auras, -20% signet reduction. It's more mid-late build and is a monster build. It helps immensely to have speed and protection on you.

Until then, I would recommend staff, which is more trait friendly. Go for air - 20% glyph reduction. It'll decrease cooldown of your harmony heal, and glyphs. If you're having trouble kiting, you should go for elemental glyph first. Always summon an earth one.

I think it's easier to do certain routines at first to help you. Later on when you are more familiar you can start branching out
Fire - Eruption, flame burst, fireball. Rollback if they are running to you Switch
Water - Chill Field, then the second ability Switch
Earth - Earth 5 immobilize, cripple line right on top of them, eruption Switch
Air - Gust, Blind, Stun field Switch

If they're on your earth elemental, you don't have to really switch. Keep refreshing eruption flame burst, and even a meteor storm if there's more than one guy on your elemental.

I think that's the main thing I haven't been doing. I've tended to pick an element and stick with it through the whole fight. I think I got in that habit from some of my other classes where I can usually switch weapons once during a fight but then I'm waiting for it to refresh. I'm guessing the elemental affinities are on separate timers so I can switch through them all and by the time I get back to, say fire, it's refreshed an ready for switching.

So I've got my Charr Thief up to level 55 or so. I started out, like many probably do, focusing on crit % and damage (as well as bleed) but as I've hit higher level zones and started doing some dungeons, I've tried to become a bit hardier. I see a lot of people posting level 80 builds and such, but wanted to through a "mid-tier" build out there so people could see and comment.

Weapons:

Dagger/Dagger: I've tried everything else but I keep coming back to this as my primary attack. I love Death Blossom and stacking bleed damage, while also getting evade. So I spam it? Yes. Do you have to watch your initiative? Yes. But if you combine blossom with some well-timed dodges/caltrops and some shrapnel mines (for further bleed and crippling), you'll be fine. I've also tried to spec poison a bit, so I love my auto-attack on #1 (just make sure you get your Lotus Strike). I don't actually use Heartseeker much, but it's a great finisher. So much to love about D/D, but you've got to stay mobile.

Pistol/Pistol: Again, I've tried to love short-bow but I just can't get into it even though losing the AOE poison pains me. I love starting fights with the combo blind of Black Powder + Unload - but you've got to make sure your initiative is maxed. Then I can rush in with D/D and start the poison/bleed. P/P works fine for kiting, but dodge/caltrops helps here for crippling.

Utilities:

Healing: Hide in Shadows. Love this. Can't count the number of times it's saved my ass. When I'm playing my Guardian alt, I miss this skill most of all.

Signet of Shadows: just for the speed boost, really.

Spider Venom: 5 attacks of poison. I try to keep poison and bleeding stacked throughout the entire battle.

Shrapnel Mines: I know this is a Charr skill, but it's just great with Thieves. I use it every battle, usually multiple times. Bleed + cripple is just so useful.

Elite: Charrzooka (for now). It's a potent weapon, for sure, but I've mostly found it to be useful when engaged in group battles. It runs counter to my in-your-face melee style. I'm saving up for Dagger Storm just to see how it feels.

So the general idea here is to stay mobile and use everything you got. Steal applies poison, so don't forget about it. Maximize your condition damage and make sure they're bleeding like crazy through the whole combat. Use caltrops and mines to cripple them when you need a break to rejuvenate initiative and click your heal skill when you need a get-out-of-jail free card. Is it a glass cannon? Well, it's a thief and there isn't much armor/toughness here. But I'm putting more and more skill points into Vitality and I try to pick armor that helps condition damage and vitality, if I can.

Most importantly, it's hella fun to play. The Thief is quick, mobile, has tons of abilities to cause damage at her disposal, and can disappear/reappear in a flash. Basically, GW2 has given us a perfectly thematic class here. Comments/critiques welcome.

I've found that Shrapnel Mines works terrifically on my dps challenged mesmer.

But I am really focusing on my warrior. I've scrounged together enough to buy 1 extra character slot and now I have another gold saved towards the next one. I think I can get by without an engineer for a while so the drive to buy and 8th slot is much less than the 6th and 7th slots.

I've got a thief at 21 who's using dagger/dagger, pistol/pistol and I find that if I stick to playing my thief for a while I start getting into a really great groove and things just drop like crazy. When I start messing around with some of my other alts, however, and then come back to my thief my timing just seems to be off and I'll die a half dozen times or more before I seem to get back in the rhythm. I honestly don't have that kind of problem with my other classes. It definitely feels like the thief class takes the most finesse but it can feel absolutely great when you're really rocking things, just don't slip up.

At this level it feels like my biggest problem is running out of initiative. For a one on one fight I'll just run in with my daggers, open with cloak and dagger, circle behind them to backstab from stealth and then finish with a heartseeker or two. One on one it's just silly. It's not uncommon to kill regular mobs in 3 hits. With groups I start hitting the initiative problems. Taking on 3 mobs I'll still open with the cloak and dagger to backstab combo just because it almost instantly takes one of the guys out of the fight while opening me to very little danger. I'll then do maybe 2 or 3 death blossoms and I'm typicall tapped out at that point. If 2 of the guys are still alive at that point I start to get in trouble.

I've been trying out different utility skills but haven't really settled on anything yet. Across all of my alts I've been really unimpressed with any of the signets that tick once every 10 seconds. They just don't seem worth it. For instance the thief's Infiltrator's Signet, getting 1 initiative every 10 seconds? Generally most of my fights don't last that long. The mesmer's signet that gives a boon once every 10 seconds? Again, same problem. I can only see these being really useful when fighting raid bosses that take several minutes to kill.

I've got a thief at 21 who's using dagger/dagger, pistol/pistol and I find that if I stick to playing my thief for a while I start getting into a really great groove and things just drop like crazy. When I start messing around with some of my other alts, however, and then come back to my thief my timing just seems to be off and I'll die a half dozen times or more before I seem to get back in the rhythm. I honestly don't have that kind of problem with my other classes. It definitely feels like the thief class takes the most finesse but it can feel absolutely great when you're really rocking things, just don't slip up.

At this level it feels like my biggest problem is running out of initiative. For a one on one fight I'll just run in with my daggers, open with cloak and dagger, circle behind them to backstab from stealth and then finish with a heartseeker or two. One on one it's just silly. It's not uncommon to kill regular mobs in 3 hits. With groups I start hitting the initiative problems. Taking on 3 mobs I'll still open with the cloak and dagger to backstab combo just because it almost instantly takes one of the guys out of the fight while opening me to very little danger. I'll then do maybe 2 or 3 death blossoms and I'm typicall tapped out at that point. If 2 of the guys are still alive at that point I start to get in trouble.

I've been trying out different utility skills but haven't really settled on anything yet. Across all of my alts I've been really unimpressed with any of the signets that tick once every 10 seconds. They just don't seem worth it. For instance the thief's Infiltrator's Signet, getting 1 initiative every 10 seconds? Generally most of my fights don't last that long. The mesmer's signet that gives a boon once every 10 seconds? Again, same problem. I can only see these being really useful when fighting raid bosses that take several minutes to kill.

I use Roll for Initiative utility skill mixed with traits that increase/restore initiative.

I think that's the main thing I haven't been doing. I've tended to pick an element and stick with it through the whole fight. I think I got in that habit from some of my other classes where I can usually switch weapons once during a fight but then I'm waiting for it to refresh. I'm guessing the elemental affinities are on separate timers so I can switch through them all and by the time I get back to, say fire, it's refreshed an ready for switching.

Actually I revise what I said. I've been running dagger/dagger "traitless" for a while. I leveled up using all staff, but I went back and did a bunch of lower zones without re-traiting, and my current traits give very little dagger support. It's not quite the same since I have better gear, but done right, you should be minimizing the time enemies hit you.

You do so much damage that double dagger is fine. However, the learning curve is higher and the mistake - threshold is lower. It is a very enjoyable play style though.

As for general tips how to play. Earth is actually the least used, I personally think it's the weakest for dagger/dagger.

Easiest way is to start with Fire. You have to know burning burning's distance and approx radius. You always open with that. Ring of Fire, then fire grab. Drake's Breath is a fine follow up although if you're mobbed and taking significant damage, you need to either use a signet that immobilizes or chills or move on to Water below.

If they're alive, or more enemies, you follow up with water, Frozen Burst (chill) then cone of ice while moving sideways. You're always always always moving with dagger dagger

Switching to lightning - Ride the lightning, then backdraft will do an aoe knockback that will buy you time. If you're going to engage in melee range, open with the stun aura, then weakness whip if you're switching to it.

Earth, I never do earth 5 unless it's being tanked. Always knockdown, then the second ability, then off to other attunements.

Don't use autotargeting in options. If turn it off, ride the lightning is your Get Out of Jail card. You deselect your current and ride the lightning away. It's tremendously good. If you're in an event, you'll want to run in blow your aoes, then run out. Later, you'll be able to spec for protection and swiftness when you have auras up, so you can even survive a blow from a very strong champion.

The first fire talent isn't set in stone. Burning 5% bonus, 10% while fire are both fine. With the final build, I actually start with earth for the Glyph of Elemental Power, which gives all your spells a chance to cripple (a pretty good chance too, probably like 25 from personal experience) if you cast it while in earth attunement. I open up with fire signet (for massive damage) do the fire skills, immobilize pull off drake's breath, then everything else is the same. Enemies will have a very hard time reaching you, except archers and mages and can generally take on anything veteran solo.

My first character was a condition focused engineer that got pretty stale around level 35. After painfully getting an elementalist and mesmer to level 10 or so, I decided to try out a necro...man, this class is FUN. And questing is infinitely easier. Minion AI is pretty terrible but they are at least useful as meat shields. Anyone have builds for a condition or wells focus?

Also, if anyone is looking for a gaming mouse Newegg has Razer Nagas for $10 off.

In my opinion, grenade kit is far by the most useful out of the engineer kits for dungeons. Every explorable I've done, I've never thought there was too much aoe damage, except against the solo boss with no adds (which you have to kill hordes of mobs to get there anyway)

Grenade kit with elixir gun support. Pop a healing circle when it's back on cooldown, maybe cleanse allies once in a while, go back to grenading.

I got my mesmer up to the low 50s a few days ago. It felt like I was starting to drag right before level 40, but traits really opened things up for me. For solo PvE I recommend trying a shatter-heavy build once you hit level 40. My damage went up considerably when I tried it myself, allowing me to finish off trash mobs much more quickly and is the most reliable source of AOE damage I've found for tagging groups of mobs in dynamic events. The build is pretty straightforward and emphasizes raw, front-loaded damage, but can also hang tough in longer-lasting fights thanks to plentiful clones, an emphasis on dodging, and comfort at both long range (greatsword) and melee (sword+focus).

Greatsword is the strongest damage-dealing weapon for mesmers, and is straightforward to use. I don't think the secondary weapon matters much. I used Sword+Pistol for a while but the phantasmal duelist started getting less useful, especially once I went to a shatter-heavy build. I use the focus primarily for Temporal Curtain (the mesmer's only speed boost). The regular sword is fun when you want to switch up your style and mix it up in melee range, where blurred frenzy becomes crucial, and the Illusionary Warden (focus #5) is pretty strong as well.

Once you hit level 40 go to the skill trainer and pay 1 gold for the ability to get traits up to 20. The traits you really want are Deceptive Evasion (15 points in Dueling, create an illusion when you dodge), Mental Torment (10 points in Domination, +20% mind wrack damage) and Illusionist's Celerity (5 in Illusions, reduces cooldown of all Illusion-summoning skills).

That's pretty much all you need. Dodging allows you to create many more illusions than you could before, so you can finally start to explore the shatter mechanic in-depth. Gaining vigor from critical hits (5 points in dueling) has great synergy with this build, and encourages you to dodge a lot more often which is a good habit to develop.

Beyond that, go to town with whatever you like. Personally I find the utility skills are a bit lackluster for solo PvE, but there are plenty of interesting choices for group play. When I'm solo I like Decoy for the ability to run through a map past mobs when I don't want to fight, and it's an extra illusion to shatter. Same with Mirror Images. and both break stun and can be used while on the ground (as can your shatter skills) which starts to become increasingly important. Feedback is only useful in around 1/3 of the fights, but it's very strong in those cases, and it gives an ethereal combo field to play with (sword #3 and greatsword #2 are combo finishers).

For solo play I prefer Moa Morph as my elite for the ability go get breathing room against tougher enemies and when I get overwhelmed by adds. Time Warp is hands-down much stronger in group play.

For traits I plan to maximize greatsword by getting Greatsword Training (20 in Domination, +50 power and 20% reduced cooldown on greatsword skills), as well as Illusionary Elasticity (20 Illusions, Bouncing attacks have one additional bounce).

I recently started a Mesmer and got her into the low teens, I think I've found my class! Love the greatsword as a long range DPS weapon, it's just such a cool concept, I like that each weapon change with a class almost makes it feel like an entirely different class altogether.

I'm sure I'll be back in here with some Mesmer questions of my own at some stage. Especially since this is the only GW2 thread moving slow enough for me to keep up with.